WPR15FA200 · Maniscalco GREAT LAKES 2T1A-E
Maniscalco GREAT LAKES 2T1A-E · Accident: loss of control in flight while maneuvering
From Corona, CA to Corona, CA
Event
- NTSB case
- WPR15FA200
- Event typeAccident: someone killed or seriously injured, or the aircraft substantially damaged (NTSB definition). Incident: an occurrence that affected or could have affected safety, short of that. Glossary
- Accident
- InvestigationHow far the investigation had got when the record was published: preliminary, ongoing, final or completed. Unknown where the source does not say. Glossary
- Completed
- API-reported fatalities
- 1 · all aircraft and ground
- Ground fatalities
- Unknown
- OperationWhat kind of flying it was, grouped by the rules it flew under: airline (US Part 121), air taxi and commuter (Part 135), general aviation (Part 91 and similar), military or government. Glossary
- General aviation
- WeatherVisual meteorological conditions (VMC): good enough to fly by looking outside. Instrument conditions (IMC): cloud or low visibility, flying by instruments. Glossary
- Visual Meteorological Cond
Maniscalco GREAT LAKES 2T1A-E
- Aircraft type
- Maniscalco GREAT LAKES
- Category
- Airplane
- RegistrationThe aircraft's tail number, such as N12345 or G-ABCD. Registrations are reissued, so the same one years apart can be a different aircraft. Glossary
- N7LM
- Operator
- Unknown
- Onboard fatalities
- Unknown
- Route
- From Corona, CATo Corona, CA
- Aircraft age
- About 36 years (built 1979)
- Flight rulesThe regulations the flight operated under: in the US, Part 91 (general aviation), Part 121 (airlines), Part 135 (air taxi and commuter) and others; for flights abroad, the NTSB's coarser commercial or non-commercial code. Glossary
- Part 91: General Aviation
- Phase of flightThe stage of the flight when things started to go wrong: standing, taxi, takeoff, initial climb, en route, maneuvering, approach or landing. Glossary
- Maneuvering
- Defining eventThe single coded event the NTSB judges best describes what happened (records from 2008 on). Older records name the first occurrence in the sequence instead. Glossary
- Loss of control in flight
- DamageDestroyed: beyond practical repair. Substantial: damage that affects the structure, performance or handling and normally needs major repair. Minor: less than that. Glossary
- Destroyed
Cause areas
- Aircraft › Aircraft oper/perf/capability
- Personnel issues › Task performance
Approximate · Coordinates as recorded by the NTSB; no uncertainty radius is established.
NTSB narrative
The private pilot was taking his second passenger of the day on a sightseeing flight. Based on onboard video, after making several shallow turns, the airplane entered a steep left turn, the nose fell, and the airplane stalled; the pilot initiated a recovery. The passenger later stated that the airplane shook violently from side to side and that the pilot apologized to her over the microphone and stated that it would not happen again. The onboard video indicated that, less than 1 minute later and without gaining altitude, the pilot initiated a moderate turn. During the turn, the engine noise decreased, the airplane began to shake, and the airplane departed controlled flight. The video showed the pilot attempt to initiate a recovery. However, because of the airplane's low altitude, the pilot was not able to regain control, and the airplane struck the ground.
On-site examination determined that the fuel tank was not breached. There was no fuel odor, no signs of leakage such as stains on the wing or ground, and the tank contained no fuel. Postaccident examination of the engine did not reveal any anomalies that would have precluded normal operation.
Toxicology results for the pilot revealed that the sedating antihistamine diphenhydramine was detected in his urine but not in his blood. Thus, it would not have had any ongoing systemic effects. The pilot had coronary artery disease; however, it was unlikely that he had any symptoms that would have impaired his ability to safely operate the airplane, particularly given his reaction to the loss of control and his attempted recovery.
It is likely that the pilot became distracted by the loss of engine power due to fuel exhaustion, and stalled the airplane, which entered a spin too low to the ground to allow recovery.
Probable cause
The pilot's failure to maintain adequate airspeed and his exceedance of the airplane's critical angle-of-attack while maneuvering, which resulted in a stall/spin at too low an altitude to allow recovery. Contributing to the accident was the pilot's improper fuel planning and his distraction by the loss of engine power due to fuel exhaustion.
Verbatim NTSB analysis and probable cause from the NTSB dataset
Sources
NTSB record WPR15FA200
- Event ID
- 20150628X82902
- Case number
- WPR15FA200
- Dataset
- full-current
- Source SHA-256
- 5cf380f0061817c0331a6b2d8cc7e0ee3a79bea469a1001dc5c10e56f35f5ab3
Source notes (4)
- Unreviewed is an editorial label, not an investigation status. API-sourced is not report-checked or human-reviewed. Explicit event totals are used without summing aircraft injury tables; onboard allocation is withheld. Unknown values remain unknown. The operation category is mapped from the NTSB-reported FAR part and has not been reviewed.
- Filled from the NTSB case API where the bulk record had no value: investigation status. Values present in the bulk record are kept.
- The date is the local date, which is the same as the UTC date the NTSB stores.
- API snapshot SHA-256: e64705534b63e6bf17db81c4254110b344df7d63ef2ec299f8477de847f22726; retrieved 2026-09-14T19:45:08.929Z.